This sermon had concluded with the following hymn, which Draxy had written when Reuby was only a few weeks old:—­

  The Love of God.

  Like a cradle rocking, rocking,
    Silent, peaceful, to and fro,
  Like a mother’s sweet looks dropping
    On the little face below,
  Hangs the green earth, swinging, turning,
    Jarless, noiseless, safe and slow;
  Falls the light of God’s face bending
    Down and watching us below.

  And as feeble babes that suffer,
    Toss and cry, and will not rest,
  Are the ones the tender mother
    Holds the closest, loves the best,
  So when we are weak and wretched,
    By our sins weighed down, distressed,
  Then it is that God’s great patience
    Holds us closest, loves us best.

  O great Heart of God! whose loving
    Cannot hindered be nor crossed;
  Will not weary, will not even
    In our death itself be lost—­
  Love divine! of such great loving,
    Only mothers know the cost—­
  Cost of love, which all love passing,
    Gave a Son to save the lost.

There is little more to tell of Draxy’s ministry.  It closed as suddenly as it had begun.

It was just five years after the Elder’s death that she found herself, one Sunday morning, feeling singularly feeble and lifeless.  She was bewildered at the sensation, for in her apparent health she had never felt it before.  She could hardly walk, could hardly stand.  She felt also a strange apathy which prevented her being alarmed.

“It is nothing,” she said; “I dare say most women are so all the time; I don’t feel in the least ill;” and she insisted upon it that no one should remain at home with her.  It was a communion Sunday and Elder Williams was to preach.

“How fortunate it is that Mr. Williams was here!” she thought languidly, as she seated herself in the eastern bay-window, to watch Reuby down the hill.  He walked between his grandparents, holding each by the hand, talking merrily and looking up into their faces.

Draxy watched them until their figures became dim, black specks, and finally faded out of sight.  Then she listened dreamily to the notes of the slow-tolling bell; when it ceased she closed her eyes, and her thoughts ran back, far back to the days when she was “little Draxy” and Elder Kinney was only her pastor.  Slowly she lived her life since then over again, its joy and its sorrow alike softened in her tender, brooding thoughts.  The soft whirring sound of a bird’s wings in the air roused her:  as it flew past the window she saw that it was one of the yellow-hammers, which still built their nests in the maple-grove behind the house.

“Ah,” thought she, “I suppose it can’t be one of the same birds we saw that day.  But it’s going on errands just the same.  I wonder, dear Seth, if mine are nearly done.”

At that instant a terrible pain shot through her left side and forced a sharp cry from her lips.  She half rose exclaiming, “Reuby, oh, darling!” and sank back in her chair unconscious.